Ryan Wood and Steve Brooks have had a strong start to the opening day of the 2026 GT World Challenge Australia powered by AWS season, with another top-of-the-timesheets effort on Friday afternoon.
With 15 cars taking to the famous Phillip Island Grand Prix Circuit for Practice 2, it was the Kiwi duo who finished with the fastest time behind the wheel of the Wolfbrook Motorsport Audi R8 LMS EVO II.
Once again, it was Wood who set the fastest time of the session once he got in the car, with his time of 1:26.069 on lap 27 proving unbeatable for the rest of the field.
The crew to come closest to Wood was the reigning champions Brad Schumacher and Broc Feeney, who ended the session almost two tenths of a second behind the Wolfbrook Motorsport duo.
After not breaking into the top five in the first practice session, Schumacher and Feeney were quick in both their stints in the Kelso Electrical Team MPC Audi R8 LMS EVO II, with the latter posting their best time on lap 22.
In third for the session was Move My Wheels by Tigani Motorsport’s Jayden Ojeda and Paul Lucchitti, with a best time of 1:26.384 in the team’s Mercedes-AMG GT3 EVO , after Ojeda produced his fastest lap on his final attempt.
Going fourth fastest was the Team Castrol BRM Audi R8 LMS EVO II of Thomas Randle and Mark Rosser, who just missed out on posting the third fastest time of the session by two hundredths of a second – highlighting the closeness of the competition.
Rounding out the top five was the ARGT Ferrari 296 GT3 of Jaxon Evans and Elliott Schutte, who were a further three tenths of a second off Randle and Rosser.
In the Trophy class, the AED Consulting by Tigani Motorsport Porsche 911 GT3R (991.1) of Luke Youlden and Nathan Halstead went fastest despite only completing seven laps, as the former posted a time of 1:28.192.
Paul Stokell and Matt Stoupas finished with the second-fastest time of the session, just two hundredths of a second off the Porsche. Unfortunately, it was a premature end to Practice 2 for the pair after Stoupas went off the track towards the end of Practice 2.
The KFC Team MPC Audi R8 LMS EVO II wasn’t the only car to go off track, after Shane Smollen in the Kollosche AMG by Tigani Motorsport Mercedes-AMG GT3 EVO he shares with Oscar Targett brought out the red flag earlier in the session.
View full results from Practice 2.
GT World Challenge Australia powered by AWS returns tomorrow morning for Qualifying 1 and 2 at 11:15am AEDT.